


Water In My Soul, Land In My Heart

by misunderstood_writings



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: F/M, Interspecies Relationship(s), Multi, Pirates, Romance, mermaid au
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-05-09
Updated: 2020-05-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:13:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24085663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misunderstood_writings/pseuds/misunderstood_writings
Summary: Merfolk had been the center of many tales that you had heard at many port taverns and even on your own ship, you didn't believe them. Why should you? It's not like you'd met one, and you doubted you ever would.
Relationships: Asra (The Arcana)/Reader, Julian Devorak/Reader, Lucio/Nadia (The Arcana), Portia Devorak/Reader
Comments: 1
Kudos: 23





	Water In My Soul, Land In My Heart

It wasn’t uncommon for sailors to talk of merfolk, in fact it was almost every week that they had some new tale to spin; mermaids offering them treasures in return for their souls, offering them immortality but trapped in a watery hellscape for eternity, the list went on. You didn’t believe most of them, not because they made no sense, but because you didn’t believe in merfolk. 

Many pirates thought you foolish for not believing, but you didn’t care. It’s not like it mattered, and if they did exist, they hadn’t caused you any problems. And you wanted to keep it that way. 

Your own crew thought you insane for not believing such a thing, they often questioned if you were inebriated to the point of not thinking straight. You’d assured them you were perfectly sober, especially if you were going to captain an entire ship. 

As your ship reached land after a particularly long journey, your crew began to gather their gear for land marking and exploring. Making sure everyone got off safe, you were the last off. You had quickly glanced around the coast, spotting a tuft of red hair from behind a small gathering of large rocks you stopped and focused on it. 

Walking over to the gathering you realized that whatever the hair belonged to hadn’t noticed you. Using this to your advantage, you walked to the side of the rocks and saw a tail. Not a mammal’s tail but more of a marine tail. It was a light orange with pale yellow dorsal fins, moving so you could better see what you were looking at, you heard a shriek. 

“Oh! You uh, you found me!” It said in surprise, eyes wide and backed against the rock, “I really hoped you hadn’t seen me. But I wasn’t being creepy! I’ve just never seen humans up close before.” You watched closely as it spoke, trying to decide if you were hallucinating or if it were real. 

“You’re- you’re a mermaid.” 

The mermaid’s facial expression relaxed. “You’re more calm about all this than I thought you would be. My name’s Portia. What’s yours?”

You blinked and shook your head, this Portia was speaking to you. She looked harmless enough, but you could never be too careful with these sorts of things. “It’s (Y/N), nice to meet you Portia.” 

She put out her hand for you to shake, seeing no reason not to, you took it. She shook your hand firmly and let out a relaxed sigh. “You know, you’re a lot nicer than I thought. My brother always says we should stay as far away from humans and that they’re really mean. I don’t think he’s ever been around a human in all honesty.”

“You have a brother?” You asked as you watched her face contort in confusion, not understanding what you didn’t understand. She laughed.

“Mermaids can have more than one child, silly. It’s not like we have one kid and then physically can’t anymore.” Portia explained, “I mean, hell, we can even mate with people. We’re close enough genetically that it works. But I don’t think that those offspring can have kids.”

“Like mules?”

“I don’t know what those are, but I guess I’ll just have to take your word for it.” She nodded once.

One thing that didn’t escape your attention for long was the fact that she said it was possible for humans and merfolk to “mate”, as she so delicately put it. “So, how exactly do you, you know, ‘mate’ with humans? I mean, you’re-”

“Part fish? Yeah, we get that a lot.” She said cutting you off. “During mating season we go on land, I mean, it’d be kinda weird if we mated the same way fish do, wouldn’t it?”

Portia had a point. You couldn’t figure out for the life of you how they managed to survive on land. The confusion must've been evident on your face, seeing as how Portia spoke again.

“We look human when we go on land, some evolutionary thing. If I were on land over there,” she said pointing to the beach, “I’d look like you.” 

“So I could’ve run into mermaids on land before?” 

Portia nodded, “Yup, the only one I’m sure you’ve never seen on land is my brother. He really doesn’t like you guys and I don’t know why. You’re so nice!”

“Portia, I’m a literal pirate.”

“Well, aside from that.” She beamed at you, crossing her arms over her chest. “I think we get along  _ swimmingly _ .” You groaned at the pun. “Come on, that was a good one.” Hearing a splashing from afar, Portia whipped her head in that direction. Quickly sparing you one last glance she spoke, “That’s probably my brother. I’ve gotta go. It was nice meeting you though!” 

Finishing her sentence she jumped off the rocks and into the water, swimming hastily and leaving you alone on the rocks.


End file.
